Westridge School’s work to build its speech and debate program is off to a strong start. This year, with the guidance of its new coaching team of Coach Gia and Coach Nicole, the team grew from five to 45 members and made an impressive showing at the Jack Howe invitational last weekend at CSU Long Beach. The tournament had 97 teams and more than 1,000 middle and upper school students competing from 15 different states. Twenty two Westridge students attended and entered more than 10 speech and debate events. As a first-year team, Westridge placed 8th out of the 97 teams in Speech Sweepstakes, and 40th out of the 97 teams in Debate Sweepstakes. Individual highlights included: